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Alright, another fan art event. Let's just do the first variation one again, since that worked out well and it has been a while.

I'll start things off by posting an image of a single character. The next poster posts a picture of that character and another one. Then, the poster after that posts a picture with the second character (without the first) and a different character. And so on. Characters can't be repeated. So, I could post Twilight, then the next person could post Twilight and SciTwi, then the next person posts SciTwi and Sunset Shimmer, then Sunset and Celestia, and so on. More than two characters are allowed in an image, but you have to say who the second character is.

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That "Metal Gear Friendship" video is really well animated; up there with JanAnimations work in terms of authenticity I think.

I can't deal with those "fans do impressions of ponies singing pop songs" videos, though. I don't cringe easily at MLP fan stuff, but those get me big time. And I actually don't mind the original song in this case,

Alright, another fan art event. Let's just do the first variation one again, since that worked out well and it has been a while.

I'll start things off by posting an image of a single character. The next poster posts a picture of that character and another one. Then, the poster after that posts a picture with the second character (without the first) and a different character. And so on. Characters can't be repeated. So, I could post Twilight, then the next person could post Twilight and SciTwi, then the next person posts SciTwi and Sunset Shimmer, then Sunset and Celestia, and so on. More than two characters are allowed in an image, but you have to say who the second character is.

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That "Metal Gear Friendship" video is really well animated; up there with JanAnimations work in terms of authenticity I think.

I can't deal with those "fans do impressions of ponies singing pop songs" videos, though. I don't cringe easily at MLP fan stuff, but those get me big time. And I actually don't mind the original song in this case,

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It's undoubtedly good, but I think there's still something off about it, though I can't say for sure if that's just BrutalWeather's style and they do it on purpose.
Jan's works are basically indistinguishable from the show, and the fact that he did everything by himself is truly impressive, he must be some kind of robot. Looking at his channel, where there are other animation experiments (like one in the South Park style), maybe he's "just" good at copying, but boy, he's really good at that.

PS: Sorry if I don't continue the game, but I can't really go look for an appropriate image at the moment.

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So Spike isn't that popular, huh? To make things easier, you can search on Derpibooru for art using this search query: spike, <INSERT CHARACTER>, NOT screencap, NOT idw, NOT comic, NOT official, score.gte:20

That last part removes things with a low number of votes, so it should filter out the particularly weak stuff (though it will also remove newer stuff). You can increase it to a higher value to filter out more.

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When you mentioned Twi-Luna shipping Sigma I knew what you were referring to. For those that don't know two artists (one of whom is the guy Sigma was posting) are both creating tons of art for an imagined marriage between Twilight and Luna. Both of them combined have probably created over 30 pieces of art over the event. Most of the stuff has been posted on the MLP subreddit which is how I found out about it. I think the idea of a massive fandom event that several content creators are contributing to is a pretty cool idea and that I've never been a person that really got into shipping but the whole event has been pretty weird to me. It probably doesn't help that I just find Twi-Luna to be a pretty forced pairing as the two have never really bonded on-screen and don't appear to have much in common.

Don't know where I was going with this. Have some pony. (Next character is Starlight)

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I hadn't realized this was a big fandom event. Those used to be more common, and the Ask Pony blogs generally would cross over a lot, though that wasn't necessarily a good thing. I remember there was a good Ask the Cutie Mark Crusaders blog with show-accurate art, but it went into this long tangent into a crossover event about house haunted by Slenderman, and I wasn't a fan of that.

Anyway, next is Sunburst. And yes, there is a decent amount of variety in characters he's depicted with in fan art.

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DP, but here is a fan animation called "Different view of reality", showing an alternate version of the Equestria Girls story where Twilight follows Sunset into another pony world. It's four and a half minutes long. It's overall pretty neat, but some is a bit self indulgent (

This episode stands out as one of the early episodes with an aggressively girly premise that surprises you with its quality. Somehow, there I was watching a fashion show toward the end of the episode and enjoying it. A lot of people point out this episode as the one where Rarity became a very likeable character for them, but for me, it took until around "A Dog and Pony Show". I mean, I appreciated what the show was doing with her, but I still wouldn't have considered her a favorite character until that second episode. The song is great, and I recall noticing the subtext of it also applying to animation ("Make sure it stays within our budget") on my first viewing.

If there's one big flaw of the episode, it's that the scene where the girls decide they don't like the first versions of the dresses isn't handled very well. After the dresses are revealed, it cuts to their unimpressed reaction as if we were also supposed to find them unimpressive, leaving the audience confused if they didn't see what was wrong with the dresses. I think it would have been better if the girls were actually impressed by them, but then one of them says that it isn't quite what they hoped for and they have some small suggestions. Then the others say the same thing. And then we get the rest of the episode as usual.

FlutterhoodiedPretty PrincessAquarius - Remember those official zodiac ponies that were popular for a while? I still wonder what was behind their creation.Falling in Love - In an alternate world, this could have been the random shipping art to close out this fan art event.

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Just read the newest chapter of that fanfic I've brought up before, The Enchanted Library. If there's one thing I can give this author credit for, she's damn good at emotional manipulation.

As a refresher, this story is an AU where the princesses other than Cadance were sealed away by Discord thousands of years ago. In the present, Rarity discovers Twilight's library and she appears as a ghost-like figure. After a rocky start, Rarity is able to get Twilight to open up and brings more ponies to meet her, and after about 20 long chapters of slow burn romance (with adventures mixed in), Rarity and Twilight are openly in love with each other. Which brings us to recent events.

After an adorable fluffy chapter where everyone has a sleepover at Twilight's library, Rarity and the others have gone to meet the descendant of Princess Cadance, hoping to get her aid in finding a way to release the princesses. After getting past bureaucracy seemingly designed to stop anyone from meeting her, and oddly getting help from Discord, they are finally able to present her with evidence that Twilight exists and where she can be found.

At the start of the story, there were rumors that Discord cursed Cadance and all of her descendants to never be able to find where the other princesses are, and rumors differed about how this worked. Others have since suggested that her descendant simply doesn't care about finding them, and may even be working with Discord, which is what Rarity came to suspect. Then the other shoe drops. It turns out that the curse is real, and it spreads to anyone who tries to help them find the princesses. And now Rarity and the others have it, so it will be impossible for them to find Twilight's library again.

The chapter ends before they get back to Ponyville, so it's not 100% confirmed the curse is real, but the author's comments indicate that she's going through with it. She says, paraphrased, "People asked me if I really spent 20 chapters building up Twilight and Rarity falling in love. The answer is no, I spent 20 chapters building up splitting them apart." I have to say, well played. But still, (insert Code Geass Nina screaming face).

EDIT: You know what, going to ramble more.

The thing about it is, I'm pretty sure Twilight and Rarity will still end up together happily, but I know what this author is capable of in between. It's perfectly within my expectations of her to make it so that they don't reunite for 40 years, or maybe Twilight is released by some descendant of Sweetie Belle (since Rarity was too heartbroken to ever marry) and Twilight visits Rarity on her deathbed. Or maybe the author will be nice and make only three years pass before they reunite. I don't expect anything below the scale of years. Meanwhile, Twilight has no way of knowing why Rarity is no longer visiting, so she can only imagine she was killed, and she's all alone in the library. There is the out that Pinkie wasn't present at the meeting with Cadance's descendant, so maybe she could be used to correspond with Twilight, but it's more likely that the curse will be spread to her too, and she'll be cut off from Luna.

This is twice this author has made me dwell a long time on one of her works.

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Given Mono's various comments about how this fic as a whole is only part one of two, I can't see the separation lasting terribly long in-universe. Part one pretty much has to end with Twilight being freed, unless the overall narrative arc really takes a hard left. Which is possible, but if that were going to be the case then the last chapter would've been a good place to end it, instead of still having a good deal of Act 3 to go yet.

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Given Mono's various comments about how this fic as a whole is only part one of two, I can't see the separation lasting terribly long in-universe. Part one pretty much has to end with Twilight being freed, unless the overall narrative arc really takes a hard left. Which is possible, but if that were going to be the case then the last chapter would've been a good place to end it, instead of still having a good deal of Act 3 to go yet.

Honestly, at this point, I'll be disappointed if they aren't separated for more than a year >_> Anyway, there are a couple of directions it can go, but Act 3 will almost surely resemble that part of Hikaru no Go where (Hikaru no Go spoilers)

Sai disappears and Hikaru spends a ton of episodes depressed, looking around for clues as to where he went. He never finds him.

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Yeah, not a fan of Monochromatic's works. Just find them "sadness & drama for sadness & drama's sake", mostly, with little else going for them. But many people seem to like them, so who am I to judge?

Speaking of fanfiction, for some reason yesterday I happened to read a couple of short gore/sex fics, you know, the typical nasty stuff. I'm not impressed or upset by such things, so the only reaction they elicited was more like:

To be fair, she writes adorable fluff scenes well. But yeah, the drama can be a bit much at times. I said previously that "Injuring Eternity" affected me emotionally, but I also complained that Twilight still being so heartbroken a thousand years later about Rarity dying didn't ring true. Like, emotions resurfacing when she went to the past would have been fine, but I didn't like the implication that she was basically miserable before the trip. And outside of that, a lot of stories follow the pattern of either Twilight or Rarity getting unreasonably worried about the other not liking her, or otherwise refusing to stay together for a dumb reason, which is easily resolved by just talking to each other. The worst of these is that story where they refuse to date because it would upset Spike. But it mainly seems to be her older stories that are like this; the more recent ones aren't as bad about it.

As for many people liking them, I don't think Monochromatic is particularly well known, it's mainly just me bringing her up >_>

Writing this got me to look through her list of fics again, and I thus noticed some of the story collections had updates I missed, including a "The Enchanted Library" side story where she outright states in an author's note (relates to previous spoilers)

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Well, relatively speaking, at least. The Enchanted Library, for example, has ~2300 votes, as many comments, and nearly 20000 views, which is way more than many other works.
That said, I'm far from being a FIMFiction aficionado, so maybe I'm just talking nonsense.

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Well, relatively speaking, at least. The Enchanted Library, for example, has ~2300 votes, as many comments, and nearly 20000 views, which is way more than many other works.
That said, I'm far from being a FIMFiction aficionado, so maybe I'm just talking nonsense.

Not a whole lot that makes it to the 20k mark, relatively speaking. Certainly a fair number of fics out there that are well beyond that, but they've also almost all had several more years to accrue hits and notoriety.

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Speaking of fanfiction, for some reason yesterday I happened to read a couple of short gore/sex fics, you know, the typical nasty stuff. I'm not impressed or upset by such things, so the only reaction they elicited was more like:

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Not a whole lot that makes it to the 20k mark, relatively speaking. Certainly a fair number of fics out there that are well beyond that, but they've also almost all had several more years to accrue hits and notoriety.

OK, I guess "The Enchanted Library" at least is decently popular, but certainly not at the level that you could expect a random fan to know about it like with "Fallout: Equestria" and the like. Though I can't imagine we'd get stories of that popularity again.

Part of it is the challenge of, "Hey, look at how gross I can make this! I bet you can't finish it!", part of it is intentionally trying to shock fans. Many of these stories, at least early on, were written by people who weren't fans to troll the fans.

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OK, I guess "The Enchanted Library" at least is decently popular, but certainly not at the level that you could expect a random fan to know about it like with "Fallout: Equestria" and the like. Though I can't imagine we'd get stories of that popularity again.

You said it, FO:E's another matter altogether. A different IP, almost, and it certainly wasn't my intention to draw any comparison to it. Although, recently I've found out that some fans don't even know what Past Sins is, so... nothing's to be taken for granted.

* Chuck complaining about songs just makes me want "Magical Mystery Cure" more.
* He forgot a lot of stuff covered in previous reviews, but I suppose I can't blame him.
* Kind of surprised that Chuck viewed the fillies as being teenagers. I mean, it's a common theory that that's what age they are meant to be, but that's mainly based on the "cutie marks = puberty" thing.
* Some of the jokes seem to show that he isn't actually aware that the Grand Galloping Gala appears in an episode.
* Also kind of surprised he didn't make the Disney comparison with "This Day Aria".
* I laughed at the political message joke.
* The next set of MLP episodes will be Rainbow Dash themed? I wonder what that would entail, if no season 4+ stuff will be included. I'm guessing "The Mysterious Mare Do Well" will be one of them. Still, that means even more time before "Magical Mystery Cure".

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So, Duo Cartoonist decided to move on from anything pony. I wasn't their biggest fans, and if I were them I'd have finished "Choices" just to go away with a bang, but it's their decision, and I respect it.

I'm not sure how I feel about them leaving because, apparently, if you want to become a professional animator, you basically can't put anything pony-related in your portfolio, as many (most?) employers tend to look down on them. Just my two cents, if something is "technically" impressive (and DC's works definitely are), who cares what the subject is, unless it's something truly problematic.

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So, Duo Cartoonist decided to move on from anything pony. I wasn't their biggest fans, and if I were them I'd have finished "Choices" just to go away with a bang, but it's their decision, and I respect it.

I'm not sure how I feel about them leaving because, apparently, if you want to become a professional animator, you basically can't put anything pony-related in your portfolio, as many (most?) employers tend to look down on them. Just my two cents, if something is "technically" impressive (and DC's works definitely are), who cares what the subject is, unless it's something truly problematic.

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So, Duo Cartoonist decided to move on from anything pony. I wasn't their biggest fans, and if I were them I'd have finished "Choices" just to go away with a bang, but it's their decision, and I respect it.

I'm not sure how I feel about them leaving because, apparently, if you want to become a professional animator, you basically can't put anything pony-related in your portfolio, as many (most?) employers tend to look down on them. Just my two cents, if something is "technically" impressive (and DC's works definitely are), who cares what the subject is, unless it's something truly problematic.

While what you say is definitely a shitty thing, I think it's best for talented animators to stop doing fanworks as early as possible. Using borrowed IP limits their ability to show their work in certain circles, and perhaps worse it limits their ability to profit from it.

It's sad for fan communities to lose talented contributors, but it really is what's best for them I think.

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While what you say is definitely a shitty thing, I think it's best for talented animators to stop doing fanworks as early as possible. Using borrowed IP limits their ability to show their work in certain circles, and perhaps worse it limits their ability to profit from it.

It's sad for fan communities to lose talented contributors, but it really is what's best for them I think.

I don't deny this, and I don't think it's a decision they've taken lightly.

However, while originality certainly pays off, I don't necessarily see something being a fanwork as a limiting factor. It gives you a well established base without having to do everything ex novo, while still giving the opportunity to show your ability. For example, Jan has done not only MLP, but also South Park, Yoka-Laylee (though this one technically is not a fanwork), etcetera, and hence showed his talent and versatility. DC's real problem, I think, is that anything "big" they've done in the last few years has been about MLP. They definitely could have diversified more and, to be blunt, that's on them. It's kinda funny how they've been doing nothing else for years and then, one day, suddenly they decided "You know, f*ck it all, no more MLP".

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I don't deny this, and I don't think it's a decision they've taken lightly.

However, while originality certainly pays off, I don't necessarily see something being a fanwork as a limiting factor. It gives you a well established base without having to do everything ex novo, while still giving the opportunity to show your ability. For example, Jan has done not only MLP, but also South Park, Yoka-Laylee (though this one technically is not a fanwork), etcetera, and hence showed his talent and versatility. DC's real problem, I think, is that anything "big" they've done in the last few years has been about MLP. They definitely could have diversified more and, to be blunt, that's on them. It's kinda funny how they've been doing nothing else for years and then, one day, suddenly they decided "You know, f*ck it all, no more MLP".

I think you're dead-right about diversity in content; I suspect it looks much better to an employer when you can say "Look at all this different stuff I've paid tribute to!" rather than "Look at all these MLP videos!"

Regarding the sudden change-of-heart, I guess everyone hits that point of realization eventually.

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Since the project is dead, I suppose I'll actually look at the "Choices" clips on their YouTube channel.CHOICES PREVIEW (WIP) - YouTube says I've seen this already. Discord's voice is good, and the art is nice.First Flight - This is a nice song.Trust in me, Child - I don't think the word "child" is said in this song. Anyway, it amuses me that this guy is a better singer than the actual John de Lancie (at least from "A Glass of Water").Midnight Frenzy - Cute song, though I don't get the sinister beginning and dialogue interjection.Preview2 - Oh, this is that first preview, but with Celestia dialogue, and then a more animated version of "Trust in me, Child".Run Away - Another nice song.

The first preview clip description mentions that this project was never intended to be completed beyond animatics, with some parts fully animated, so I don't consider it much of a shame that it never got completed. Plus, the remaining songs and whatever else has been completed is going to be put up on YouTube, and unlike some other creators, they aren't planning on taking anything down.

Pony History - Turnabout Storm - I remember following along with this series. Did it really start in 2011? Though I recall it ended after season 3, which really made the way Trixie is presented in the story awkward. There's still a fan continuation (of this fan series) coming, right? Anyway, this was an enjoyable series, if not for two huge issues: (1) WAY TOO LONG, and (2) the way Trixie and the witnesses acted was way too sinister for ponies. Oh, and I suppose I wasn't too big a fan of many voices.

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Feels like forever since I looked at fan pony content. I should look at some one of these days.

On another note, today at church I saw a little boy play with Rainbow Dash and Applejack dolls. At first I thought they were pony dolls then regular dolls so I thought "Why is this boy playing with dolls?" And after I clearly saw the ponies, I thought that was pretty cool. I may have seen Princess Cadence but I wasn't sure.

Pony History - Turnabout Storm - I remember following along with this series. Did it really start in 2011? Though I recall it ended after season 3, which really made the way Trixie is presented in the story awkward. There's still a fan continuation (of this fan series) coming, right? Anyway, this was an enjoyable series, if not for two huge issues: (1) WAY TOO LONG, and (2) the way Trixie and the witnesses acted was way too sinister for ponies. Oh, and I suppose I wasn't too big a fan of many voices.

Yeah, this project took a year or two to get finished? lol I enjoyed it as a small AA fan and pony fan. The voices are hit and miss, but I did like Phoenix's voice. The length while long really felt like an end-game AA case, kinda like Rise From the Ashes. Trixie being a jerk was kinda necessary even if she was a bit off character. She was kinda like both Franziska and Manfred so she did feel like a legitimate threat and a major antagonist. Honestly I'm not sure if that fan sequel will ever come out much less than be a decent followup. The poor dude lost his files and lost files to Phoenix's VA lines. I'd hopefully expect something in the summer for something but I'll also be waiting.

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Read "A Thousand Roses", a fanfic that Paullo posted about in the season 6 thread. It was pretty fun when the focus was on Twilight's friends sorting the love letters she got, and I didn't like it as much when it shifted to Rainbow's crush on her. I agree with Paullo that I didn't like Twilight choosing to date her despite not really being interested, especially since it came from anxiety about how no one who knew her well saw her as girlfriend material. I don't think Twilight needed to be super enthusiastic to date Rainbow, but she shouldn't have done it out of fear of being forever alone.

That reminds me, it's been about a month since I last checked out "The Enchanted Library". The author said releases would be more sporadic, but maybe a chapter came out. *checks* *there are 3 full chapters and 3 mini-chapters* ... OK, I guess I have some reading to do.

EDIT: Good thing I read these together, because

it was getting pretty dark, and only recovered at the end. It was difficult seeing Rarity straight up go crazy, but at least she's better now, and Pinkie isn't separated from Luna despite knowing about the curse. Now that they know the books are a red herring, will they bother to continue looking for them? I suppose Twilight would still want them back. At least the dreams about Harmony Light definitely aren't a vision of the future, since they relied on another mare finding the books and releasing Twilight; though the amount of time given to them in dreams meant the story would never actually go the, "Twilight is released by someone else when Rarity is old," route anyway.

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I haven't read fanfics in a long time. There were a couple I was following (Princess Luna's Suicide Solutions and To Love The Moon), but those haven't updated in a long time. Others like Within & Without and A Sweet Taste of Cake have ended.

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Alright, just played the game. Installation is a bit of a pain, since you have to install some RPG Maker stuff too. The sprites look great, but everything else is definitely unpolished. The gameplay is straightforward, but it's pretty fun for what it is, especially given that it's still a demo. I didn't like that you just get a bunch of outfits in the real world basically at once; it would have made more sense to get a new one in each dream world, but that's not how it's handled. The dialogue is decent, with some cute moments.

The combat is serviceable, but a bit repetitive, with every regular enemy acting the same, despite different sprites. I was mostly fine just fighting enemies as I came across them, but I did have to grind a bit to fight the boss in Trixie's dream. I probably should have grinded before the boss in Moondancer's dream, but that level didn't provide any opportunity to, oddly. After that point, in the levels added by the newest patch, the regular enemies give so much XP that bosses aren't a concern. My favorite levels were Moondancer's dream and the noir dream. My least favorite was Vinyl's, because compared to the other dreams, it went too far into fanon territory and cared a lot about shipping.

All together, it took less than two hours to get through all the available content.

Comics
In the Friendship is Dragons web comic, a guest artist is doing a potentially interesting series where the characters play Mafia, and it's divided between day portions and night portions you can skip to not be spoiled as to who played what role.Stable Flight

Finally got around to playing this, and it is indeed cute. You play from the perspective of Fluttershy going on a date with Pinkie, confused why Pinkie would ever be interested in someone like her. There are three major routes each with three variations in dialogue, but as the README and description emphasize, though there are points where Fluttershy is worried that the date is going badly, there are no bad endings. The game is extremely user friendly, allowing you to adjust text speed (including to appear instantly), skip past dialogue you've already seen straight to a branch or new dialogue, rewind the game whenever you choose, and more. Plus, it autosaves at each branch, in a different save slot. The art style is unique, and it doesn't work some of the time (see Rainbow Dash), but it really works with Pinkie, and that's the most important part in the end. I didn't go for all the variations, but I did play the three major routes.

The dialogue is good in the sense that nothing ever felt particularly out of character, beyond what's necessary for this premise. The interactions between Fluttershy and Pinkie are cute, with both being nervous in their own ways. A major theme of the story is how different people date in different ways, and there's no one version that works for everyone. It is a bit odd how there are a lot of minor deviations from established canon beyond the central premise that characters only allude to, such as Fluttershy having once dated Rainbow when they were younger, and I don't know what's going on with Twilight's love life. There's one line in particular that I didn't pay much mind to, but after looking at the creator's Tumblr profile, took on much more significance. I think it's neat, but I could see inserting this into an existing character rubbing people the wrong way. It also does that thing fan content often does, where it reinterprets certain events of the show to be more significant than the show itself treats them, which isn't in itself bad, but I know that bothers some people. The game is short, and going through all the variations I was interested in took about an hour. Still, if you are interested in this genre, then I recommend it. I even donated $5 to the creator.

But that's not the end of the shipping. I ended up reading two fanfics today.

Sparkle Date Me! - A Luna/Twilight story that takes place season 2-ish, featuring Luna attempting to ask out an oblivious Twilight. It's cute, if pretty generic. There's a part where Luna asks for dating advice from Fluttershy of all ponies, that I would have liked to have gone on longer. The way Twilight realizes that her dinner with Luna is a date is odd and somewhat forced. There's also an odd moment where the perspective switches to Twilight for a short segment before going back to Luna, when that segment could have easily been done from Luna's perspective. Since I'm apparently capable of ranking heartwarming fluff now, I've seen better, both in the above game and in the Rarilight fics I've read.

Dense as Diamonds - A Rarity/Twilight story, that in contrast to the above (and most Rarilight fics), involves Twilight trying to confess to an oblivious Rarity. Rarity's dialogue is naturally more entertaining than Luna's, so I enjoyed reading this more than the above. It was amusing seeing Twilight take Rarity on multiple dates without the latter realizing, and it was cute when Rarity realized what was going on, though I wasn't a fan of the surprise kiss. Cadance's inclusion was forced. Overall, well, it's cute heartwarming fluff.

Of the three shipping things I've played/read today, the game is definitely the strongest.

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Them's Fightin' Herds is starting its backer beta on the 25th. Note that you have to sign an NDA before you get to play. I don't think I'll bump up the Gaming side thread until there's more public information. Still, nice to see that there's actually stuff happening with the game now.

Phoebe and Her Unicorn comic strip about not!MLP, I believe the first new one since it transitioned to a proper newspaper comic.Pinkie Tales: Egghead and the Beast - With Twilight playing the role of Belle and a horrifying (intentionally) alicorn OC playing the role of the Beast. This one went too far in the meta territory at parts, but it's still quite enjoyable.

And lastly, in Dena/Cyborcat's review series of MLP on Channel Awesome, she reached "The Last Roundup", and thus, she had to address Derpygate in this retrospective video. Over five years later (holy crap, time flies), it's interesting to look back on the entire situation.

I was there in the thick of it when it happened, commenting on Toon Zone and lurking here and in other places. I didn't really like Derpy's first voice, and while I was glad for the fans, I didn't find her scene that interesting and I was annoyed that it was getting far more attention than the rest of the episode. I did think her voice was uncomfortably close to a stereotypical disabled girl's, and I was disappointed they went in that direction. It was later explained that Tabitha St. Germain thought the character was male, which made the voice more understandable, but I thought it was an unfortunate situation all around.

And then Derpy's voice changed in the iTunes version (I believe it was put up, then taken down, then put back up weeks later with the changes) and beyond, which caused a huge shitstorm. I forget where the information that Hasbro changed Derpy's scenes because of a few particular complaints actually came from, but it led to terrible attacks against fans that were known to have been upset about Derpy's original portrayal. The sites I frequented didn't actually have any of this, as I recall, but there was a ton of complaining about fans acting like this, which really wasn't much better. I thought Derpy's new voice was better, but I didn't like the changes to Rainbow Dash's lines and both of their expressions. During this, I mainly just wanted everyone to move on already.

After that, Derpy disappeared from the series for a while, which did worry me. But then Derpy did appear in the season 3 finale, and she proceeded to appear consistently after that, then she had a major appearance in "Rainbow Falls", and then she had a speaking role in "Slice of Life". So she's doing fine now. Oddly, I remember that people didn't have a strong reaction either way to Derpy's scenes in "Slice of Life". I thought her voice was good there.

In the end, things more or less turned out well for Derpy, other than her no longer being called that in official material. Still, I have to wonder how things would have gone if only Tabitha knew that Derpy was supposed to be female when recording her lines for "The Last Roundup". I remember this being the single biggest moment that the fandom turned on itself, and the last one in general other than that incident with the second IDW annual special about Power Ponies. How many people left the fandom because of this? If this didn't happen, would the fans have turned on themselves over something else later? Would Derpy have kept her name and continued appearing without that break in season 3?